El Campo

When one thinks of the most rural farming communities in central Nicaragua, thoughts like quiet, slow, and even boring might come to mind. And if you consider that 7:30pm is late for bed and the quietness that you not only hear but feel at that time may fool you into believing that these adjectives ring true. But unfortunately this time does not last long as someone forgot to tell the roosters, hens, pigs, birds, dogs, cats, cows, and horses about the quite hours and by 4:30 or 5:00am the hustle and bustle of farm life has begun. Locking yourself away from the action is rarely an option as everyone in the community knows exactly where you are and what you are doing. So early wake up calls of little children poking their heads in your window or in some cases around the partition of your shared room, practicing their adorable attempts at an English “good morning” become the norm. This wake up is soon followed by the first of numerous visits from community that are just stopping in to say hello, ask you questions, tell you about a meeting that may or may not happen later today, or to bring you some great new food (often some slightly different version of corn product) that you have to try.

If you can somehow pull yourself away from the multitude of conversations you have in your house, on your doorstep, on your front porch, in your driveway, and every 20 feet as you walk down the road, you can make your way in to the fields and find that peacefulness you originally envisioned as you look out over amazing vistas on property that would be a premium in the U.S. but here is just ordinary farmland.

All these wonderful things are exactly what happened to us as we were able to spend time with two amazing PCV hosts in their very small pueblos. Our days spent with Travis and then Laurie had us seriously asking the question “want to do Peace Corps again?” thinking about how wonderful it would be to do Peace Corps again as a rural agriculture volunteer.

There are certain aspects of rural farm life that we are certainly going to miss when we leave here. When you become part of a community you gain this connection that for good or bad is always with you. While in the U.S. people would erect privacy fences so they don’t have to have any interaction with neighbors, when Laurie moved in next door to her old host family, her “mom” chopped down all the bushes between the homes saying “so I can know what you’re doing.” Not exactly being nosy (though everyone in the campo knows everyone’s business) but to keep an eye out as a protector of sorts. In the campo people look after one another. You have a wide range of an extended family and living alone here, especially as “the gringo” does not really mean living alone, and that is a good feeling.

Other life in the campo happenings:

Great food
Climbing fruit trees
Roosters, hens, pigs, birds, dogs, cats, cows, and horses
Fresh milk
Making cheese
Baking in traditional hornos (clay ovens)
One or two or a million mosquitoes
Amazing hospitality
Gossip
Making peanut butter and soy milk from scratch
Celebrity status
An address that is simply “The Gringo”
Trips to the outhouse
Carrying your water
Sleeping and waking with the sun
Gardens
Fresh greens and veggies
Constant visitors
Amazing vistas after walking through farm fields
Great conversations
Extremely hard conversations
TONS and TONS of adorable children